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Sprint boots 1,000 phone customers for talking too much

So long, annoying people

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Sprint-Nextel has terminated the accounts of its 1,000 most-annoying customers. After a recent internal review, the U.S. wireless carrier gave at least 1,000 people the boot because they've been making far too many calls to the company's customer care centers. Of course, the real shocker is that the company has agreed to waIve their termination fees.

The selected customers have until the end of the month to find a new wireless carrier, the Associated Pressreports.

According to the company, each of these account holders has been phoning customer care "hundreds of times a month" for a "6 to 12 month" period.

"Over the past year, a small number of our customers - 1,000 to 1,200 – have made frequent calls regarding account information which we have been unable to resolve to their satisfaction, despite our best efforts," Sprint said. "While we have worked hard and will always work hard to resolve customer issues and questions to the best of our ability, rather than continue to operate in a situation that was unsatisfactory for our subscribers and Sprint, we chose to terminate our relationship with these particular customers to allow them to pursue other options."

Sprint goes on to say that these customers continue to hound support reps about account issues even after the issues "appear to be resolved." We can't speak for everyone, but here at The Register, we've often had disagreements with support reps about whether they've actually done their job. When this happens, all we can do is keep calling.

Of course, Sprint's announcement is good news for any of the terminated customers who are sick and tired of the service they're getting from the company. Sprint is cutting them loose without penalty fees - and they don't have to pay their final bill. Now that we think about it, 1,000 people must be very happy. Or is it 1,200?

In any event, a company spokesperson told the The Register that the decision "impacts less than 2/1000ths of 1 percent" of its customer base. And we thought no customer was too small.®